Wander
by Cinis
Summary: Once upon a time, a sword was broken. It was cast upon a stone, edge first, and it shattered into a hundred fragments of an ended life. [oneshot]


A/N: This was written with two rules:  
>1. Avoidance of proper nouns (if you know lore, you can ID people easily)<br>2. Super heavy reliance on lore and quotes from the game

A list of characters is included at the bottom.  
>Almost all spoken lines have been taken from the game.<p>

I would like to thank my beta readers: Jeff, Joe (who took the time to go over this with me line by line), and Rachel. Ya'll have been great and I could not have written this, such as it is, without you.

* * *

><p>Once upon a time, a sword was broken.<p>

It was cast upon a stone, edge first, and it shattered into a hundred fragments of an ended life.

The woman who once wielded it took the greatest piece and left the rest to the vultures that circled the blighted field. Charred clay crunched beneath her feet.

She went first to a stream where she washed blood from her hands. Rotting fish floated on the surface and the water burned her skin.

On the bank she left her armor, steel nicked by countless blades and pitted by shrapnel and devoured by poison.

She walked into a forest where thorns sliced through fabric and skin. In the dark of night, wolves prowled. She wandered paths where no breeze ever disturbed the leaves at her feet.

She walked until the trees thinned and the sun touched her face. She lay down on the grass and slept fitfully.

The enlightened one, brimming with turquoise power and sight, found her at the edge of the woods and carried her back to civilization.

She woke in a monastery. The enlightened one nursed her back from the brink of death. Filled with shame, the woman could not meet the other's serene gaze.

When she could bear kindness no more, she left. In the doorway of the temple, the enlightened one met her. "Peace begins within." The enlightened one held out the broken sword, found in the forest and kept in trust, "Your spirit is something no one can take from you. Use it wisely."

(break)

In exile she wandered alone.

She stayed away from villages and towns. The countryside was not so ravaged that she could not live off the wilds.

She walked until she reached the sea, and when she'd reached the sea she took the first boat away from her past.

On the ship, she met a mercenary fleeing from the same horrors. On the third night, she found the mercenary sitting out on the deck and watching the stars. When she approached, the mercenary said, "The only thing I look up to is the sky. Kings come and go, but gold stays." She kept her eyes focused upwards.

The woman sat down beside the mercenary. Her stomach growled. She hadn't eaten since boarding the vessel.

A soft chuckle escaped the mercenary's mouth. "Heroes go hungry."

In response, the woman frowned.

The mercenary shook her head. "I'll fight for a cause, but I won't die for one."

They both sat on the ship. They watched the stars until the sun touched the horizon.

The woman stood to leave.

"Hey," the mercenary called out. "You've got a problem. I've got a price."

Standing hungry in threadbare clothes on the deck of the ship, the woman said nothing.

The mercenary shrugged. "It's just business." For the first time, she looked over at the woman.

Their eyes met and for a while the woman stared at the mercenary. Then, with a shake of her head, the woman turned and began to walk away.

When the woman was almost to the hatch leading below deck, the mercenary sighed. "This one's on me." The woman paused and turned halfway to glance back at the other. "They say the desert is a cruel mistress, but what's lost can be found there."

The woman nodded.

The mercenary grinned at her. "Don't feed the jackals."

(break)

The woman went to the desert.

Sand stretched farther than the eye could see.

She chose a direction. She walked. Erased by the burning winds, her footprints faded behind her.

At the end of the first day, she was weary and she lay down on the sand.

At the end of the second day, the weariness had sunk into her marrow and she wondered if she had spent all her time walking in a circle.

At the end of the third day, she could no longer stand. She sank to her knees and did not rise again.

At dawn on the fourth day, she woke to find a crocodile standing above her. Though she tried, she could not avoid his gaze. After an eternity, the crocodile lifted her from the ground and carried her through a city of brass and into a great library. He laid her down before a set of massive doors.

He left her there.

(break)

The jackal's voice lifted her from her sleep.

She lay in a room on a paper floor comprised of hundreds of thousands of pages torn from books. The walls were made of crumbling scrolls. Everything, even her own body, was covered in a deep layer of dust.

The jackal stood above her. He chanted the secrets of time in a language as strange to the woman as the Void into which all things must fall.

She listened to him until he spoke to her. "Your soul will be measured."

Beneath his words, he continued his chant.

The woman tried to speak but her mouth was so dry that no words emerged.

The jackal knelt and touched her forehead and spoke his benediction. "No dawn comes without darkness."

The woman slept.

(break)

In her dream, the woman stood before a gate of ivory. Fissures split the doors and the posts and the lintel. Whatever had been carved into the pale planes was long since lost.

She pushed the gate open and crossed the threshold.

There was no light here. She sensed the ground beneath her feet, but it had no texture. The air around her had no feeling.

She was afraid.

She could smell. She smelled toxins. She smelled melting skin. She smelled cinders and ash. She smelled terror and death.

She didn't need her eyes to see them. She remembered them with perfect clarity. Their skin was a pale yellow-blue. They scraped long lines of blood across their faces with their fingernails. Acid ate through steel as easily as flesh. Frothy red saliva dripped from open mouths.

She heard the keening wail of a hundred children, women, and men.

She clamped her hands over her ears.

She couldn't block out the noise.

One by one the voices went silent.

Only the sound of her own breathing remained.

"Do I scare you, champion?"

She acted on instinct, raising the broken sword she felt in her hand.

Laughter echoed through the nightmare. "Afraid of the dark?"

The woman swung blindly. Her back erupted in pain, then her sword arm, cut to the bone. She grimaced and took her broken blade in her other hand, letting the wounded arm hang limply beside her.

She heard a faint sound, the movement of passing air. She struck out and hit nothing.

Her legs were swept out from beneath her and she fell heavily onto her back.

Hot, moist air touched her face. The breath of something inhuman. "Help is not coming," the thing said. Every word was a puff of rancid stench.

Again and again lacerations appeared on her flesh until she curled into a fetal position, seeking nothing more than to hide from the shadows. They were everywhere, around her, in her. There was no respite to be had.

The darkness laughed.

She heard every individual rib in her side shatter as the thing sliced through them in a long line from her hip to just under her arm. Thick blood poured from the wound just as it came in spurts from her mouth.

"Am I your nightmare?"

She heard the thing smiling.

The woman closed her eyes.

She was going to die.

Death was peace.

Did she deserve peace?

Choking in her own blood, she gasped, "No."

Her fingers wrapped tighter around the hilt of her broken sword. Emerald light flared from runes etched into the black rock and cut the darkness with brilliant rays.

The monster was all blades. From its fingers, from its arms, from its shoulders came blades. Stained red, they glimmered strangely in the green glow from the sword. Only the thing's face, mouthless with burning eyes, was not a weapon.

In an instant, she thrust up with her blade and warm blood dripped down from the thing's chest into her own wounds.

The mouthless visage twisted, its skin like clay, and it melted into a hundred hundred faces, each one as dead – murdered - as the last, each one asking the same question. "Am I? Am I?"

Finally the woman stared up into her own eyes.

"Am I?"

"Not anymore."

She twists the broken sword into her gut and she is once again standing in the valley. The world is lit by the soft light of dawn. There are white bones jutting up from beneath the ash of the burnt earth. A wind blows, sweeping grey dust from rusting arms and armor.

The woman limps forward through a gate of horn, leaving green grass stabbing up through the desolation in her wake.

(forge)

She wakes to the crocodile standing over her once more. She is again in the antechamber of the library and the jackal is nowhere to be seen.

She rises and the crocodile escorts her to the doors. He pushes them open, revealing a wide road, paved in white stone, extending out from the doorway. The path is flanked by tall trees and she hears the rush of a river in the distance. Travelers walk in both directions and when they come to the door, instead of passing through, they vanish.

The woman looks back at the crocodile in surprise.

The crocodile speaks.

"There is no retreat."

(forge)

The woman walks along the road.

The soldier patrols the shining road. His tread is measured with purpose and his broad back is straight. Across his shoulder he carries a sword too massive for any sheathe.

The woman stands to the side of the road to watch him pass. She brushes the hilt of her own weapon with her fingertips. Runes flash emerald.

The light catches the soldier's attention and he approaches. He stops only a few feet away.

The woman lowers her hand and drops her gaze to the ground beside the soldier.

He does not leave. He waits.

Eventually, the woman looks. As soon as their eyes meet, she looks away again. His eyes are kind. She chances another glance.

The soldier reaches out and rests a heavy gauntleted hand on her shoulder. "That sword was a vile scourge," he says.

The woman takes a deep breath and looks up. This time she keeps her gaze steady. "My hands are stained."

He nods and withdraws his hand. There is no hesitation when he says, "But you must forge onwards. You must fight for those who cannot."

A frown tugs at the corners of the woman's mouth. She chooses her word carefully. "Why?"

His reply is immediate. "Because this world needs hope." His next action is just as immediate. He turns and walks away. The cadence of his step is exactly the same as it was before he stopped.

The woman stands in the road and watches him go.

(forge)

The woman follows the road. She passes regiments and battalions marching. The ground quakes with their footfalls.

Eventually the road becomes a dirt path and she follows the worn tracks through the country side.

She comes to a village, deserted but for a fox sitting in the middle of the single street that runs through the town.

The warrior has heard of foxes and fox spirits. She approaches this one with caution and respect. When she has come a few feet from it, she bows.

The fox looks up at her and smiles. "I know what you desire," it says with a mouth full of pointy white teeth. "Even though you don't."

"Can you help me?" the woman asks.

"Yes," says the fox. "But first, indulge me." The fox now has the form of a beautiful woman with long dark hair and nine white tails. It stalks up to the woman and strokes her face.

The woman pulls away and reaches for her sword, though she does not draw it.

"Don't you trust me?" the fox asks.

Mute, the woman shakes her head no.

The fox moves its hand down from the woman's face until it's hovering over her heart. The woman wants to move away, but her body fails her. The fox smiles and wraps its tails around the woman. "It's too late for that. Let's have some real fun."

The fox's lips taste like strawberries and its teeth are just as sharp as they'd looked. The fox knows the woman's body better than she herself, and lost in the haze of ecstasy the woman forgets that she ever wanted to resist.

Through the cloud, the woman watches the fox press kisses to her naked breast and then pull away, drawing a thin green mist away with it. The fox holds the mist and forms it into an orb and then it opens its mouth, full of those sharp teeth, preternaturally wide and brings the orb up as if to swallow it whole.

Unable to care, the woman stares with empty eyes.

With the globe almost in its mouth, the fox caresses the orb with its tongue and then stops and pulls its meal away from itself. The fox cradles the orb and whispers to it. "Mercy is a human luxury… and responsibility. If you seek your humanity, remember that." The fox takes the orb and pushes it back into the woman's chest.

When the woman regains her senses, she is alone and afraid. She collects her clothes. The deserted village smells of rotting corpses hidden behind closed doors. She flees.

(forge)

She finds the monkey at the edge of the forest. He stands firm on the dirt path, barring the way into the bamboo groves beyond. When the woman approaches, he raises his staff in warning. "Have you brought me a real challenge?"

"What do you mean?" asks the woman. She stops outside the range of his staff.

He drops into a fighter's stance and then the woman understands. She raises her broken sword in answer to him.

Both cautious, they circle for long minutes as each looks for some weakness on the other. Then the monkey stops moving and simply stands. Only the briefest whisper in the air warns the woman of the strike to the back of her head. She dives out of the way, rolling over the ground and landing in a crouch with her broken sword raised. The runes glow with a faint green light.

The monkey smiles, glad for the challenge. "Wuju style," he says.

The battle begins in earnest. The monkeys' staff has great reach but the woman dodges inside of its range. She has enough of the element of surprise on her side to land a shallow cut across the monkey's chest.

He leaps back and laughs.

"Why are you laughing?" she asks.

"Because I got this," he replies. He draws his staff back and the woman braces for the powerful swing she knows is coming. He will try to overwhelm her with brute force, but she'll be ready.

Against all her expectations, he swings from far out of range – but his swing spins him around and he keeps spinning, faster and faster and faster. Every revolution is a strike and when he comes into range she can block some of them, but not all of them. One blow lands across her jaw and sends her flying back.

When the onslaught ends, the woman readily admits defeat.

The monkey smiles and leans on his staff. "Every mistake is a lesson," he says. "Improve your skills! Then find me again."

(forge)

The woman turns away from the bamboo forest. To fight, she thinks, she needs her sword to be whole.

Her feet take her back to that place where she first held her blade. She will not call that land 'home.' Great black buildings pierce the dark sky on either side of the street she walks. Guards watch travelers for any signs of weakness to exploit. The woman hides her face and shows no weakness and thus she passes unhindered.

Only the assassin notices her. They meet on the doorstep of a stately mansion.

Before the woman can speak, the assassin draws her blades. "Blood for Noxus, traitor."

The woman cringes but says nothing in response. There's nothing to be said. She draws her broken sword and they dance. The assassin is faster, but the woman is stronger and just fast enough to force the battle to progress at her speed.

The assassin moves with a purpose the woman lacks. She sees an opening in the woman's guard and strikes out. The blow leaves a long, deep gash across the woman's abdomen. "Too easy," the assassin sneers.

But in the assassin's gloating, the woman catches the opportunity she was waiting for and kicks out, sweeping the assassin's legs out from under her. Using superior strength, the woman wrestles the assassin to the ground and pushes the sharp edge of her broken sword against the other's neck – but not into.

The assassin snarls. She pushes the point of a knife into the woman's back, just hard enough to make its presence known.

Minutes pass as the two stare into each other's eyes, each waiting for some sign to either back off or go for the kill.

The assassin breaks first. She puts her knife down and looks away. "You've made your choice. There's no going back."

The woman slowly gets up and stumbles back. She drops to her knees and pants. She looks up at the assassin, a question in her eyes.

Covered in her enemy's blood, the assassin scoffs. "Why? Because I can."

(forge)

When the woman finds the snake in a far corner of the mansion, she's already so weak from her wound that she collapses on the dark marble floor. The stone is frigid against her skin. She presses both hands against her stomach in a futile attempt to staunch the bleeding.

The snake slithers to her side and stares down dispassionately. "Eventually, they all come crawling back."

Faint from blood loss, the woman looks up at the snake. There's a dark cloud over her vision and she doesn't understand what she's seeing. She reaches out and her bloody fingers brush against slick scales and leave crimson lines against green.

The snake arches back, away from the woman's touch. She starts to hiss but stops herself, putting a hand over her mouth.

The woman's lips mouth words, but no sound comes forth. Her world fades away.

(forge)

A few times the woman almost rises to consciousness. Sometimes she thinks she's come back home. Sometimes she doesn't know where home is. Each time she sinks back down into the black.

(forge)

When the woman wakes, she sees her stomach covered in white bandages. How much time has passed? She has no idea. The world spins when she moves her head too quickly. She's lying on a couch in a familiar bedroom. She doesn't pause to admire the room's opulent furnishings. She looks for the snake.

The snake sits by the large window that overlooks the city. She stares out on the world beyond and makes no move to indicate she knows the woman has risen.

The woman studies the snake intently, taking in every scale and shadow and glimmer of gold.

The snake turns to face her guest and the woman immediately looks away. The snake hugs herself.

The woman picks at a worn spot in the soft fabric of the couch. She opens her mouth to speak but then closes it. She looks up.

This time the snake looks away. She turns her to the side and glances all around the room. There's nowhere to hide.

When the woman finally finds words, they come slow with a pause between every one. "I came because I needed… help."

The snake blinks rapidly and hugs herself tighter. Her body coils back and forth around itself and she seems to shrink away.

The woman's jaw clenches and she swallows. She hesitates, then, with great effort, the woman pushes herself up from the couch. Every step sends a searing lance of pain shooting through her abdomen, but she pushes herself to walk forward until she's barely a foot away from the snake. Red blood begins to stain her bandage. The woman raises a hand toward the snake's cheek, but the snake swats it away.

"Don't," the snake hisses. She twists her tail and pushes herself higher until her narrowed eyes are at the same level as the woman's. "You found me beautiful, once. Now you think I'm a freak."

The woman shakes her head. White bangs swish back and forth over reddish-brown eyes. Her mouth hangs slightly open in shock.

The snake holds herself mere inches from the woman. The snake's eyes are wide now and they flutter back and forth, back and forth, across the woman's face. "Do you find me beautiful still?"

The woman closes her mouth and is silent and still. She's standing too close to see any of the snake but her face, surrounded by its cobra's hood.

The snake's next words come out in low hiss, "Don't make me beg."

When the woman moves, it's all at once. She leans forward and takes the snake's face in both her hands and crushes their lips together. She drops her hands lower and pulls the snake close.

The snake's fingers are sharp talons that slice away the remnants of the woman's clothes and cut long lines into the woman's back.

The woman reciprocates by grabbing the snake's shoulders and shoving her to the ground.

There's a puddle of blood on the marble floor when they finally part. The snake caresses the woman's cheek. The woman herself is fading from consciousness once more. The snake smiles. "I'll take care of everything."

(forge)

The woman finds herself on the road once more. She's clean and wears new clothes for the first time in what feels like her entire life. She has a direction and a goal. The snake tells her there is one person in all the world who can reforge her sword, but the smith lives in a faraway land.

She walks for weeks until she reaches the walls of the shining city.

The statue, made from granite veined with bronze, guards the great gates of gold and silver and pearl. He unfurls his wings out so that he blocks entry. "All have their place," he says.

The woman does not slow her step until she stands before the statue. She is tiny in his shadow. She looks up and meets his red eyes.

The statue breaks eye contact first. He shrugs and folds his wings again. He stands aside.

He says nothing more until the woman has set her hand on the gates to push them open. Then, more to himself than to her, he mumbles, "There is no such thing as redemption. Only penance."

(forge)

The buildings of this silver city rise up into the clouds and their every surface is gleaming marble and steel in the light of the sun. The woman shields her eyes as she walks the streets.

The smith at the forge in the center of the city glares when the door opens. She is short with pale blue skin and hair as white as the woman's.

The woman holds up her broken blade. "Can what was broken be reforged?"

The smith scowls. "Fighting is serious business."

"Violence to end violence," the woman argues.

The smith lifts a heavy hammer from the forge in one hand and takes the broken blade in the other. "If it will bring peace." The smith pauses and looks at the woman. "If it will bring _you_ peace."

The renewed blade is as wide as the woman's forearm and as long as she is tall. At its base, the black fragment the woman carried for so long still bears the runes etched with ancient sorcery. Beyond that is grey steel, marked with the patterns of flowing water.

(forge)

When the woman returns to the bamboo forest, the monkey is gone. In his place a bladesman sits in the road. He meditates.

The woman sits down across from him and waits.

It is sundown when the bladesman looks up. His eyes are hidden behind a septet of goggles. He is not surprised to see the woman. They both stand and bow. He nods at the woman's sword. "The edge of the sharpest blade is no match for the calm of the peaceful mind. Show me what you have learned."

At first the full sword in the woman's hands is heavy with an unfamiliar weight but after a few exchanges she finds her old rhythm once more. They whirl in the light of the setting sun. Neither combatant hurries their step even when darkness falls.

The runes still etched in the strong of the woman's blade glow brightly enough to fight by.

Time stretches and yet still they dance.

When the sun rises, the bladesman steps back and bows. "I will show you the path," he says.

For days they walk through the endless expanse of green bamboo.

At last they reach a clearing. The bladesman nods to the woman. "Do not let your pride blind you."

(break)

In the clearing a man waits. He sets down his gourd and draws his blade. "The story of a sword is inked in blood," he says. "This blade never gets any lighter."

"A sword mirrors its owner," replies the woman.

The fight begins unceremoniously. The man dashes forward with a clean upward slash that would split the woman from hip to shoulder if it connected. The woman dodges and tries to cut off his head in retaliation. It progresses from there.

There's no room for error in this brawl. Any mistake will cost one or both of them their life.

The man nicks the woman's thigh and they separate. The sight of blood makes him bold. "Which weighs more? Your blade, or your past?"

Anger does more for the woman than adrenaline and she leaps forward. She swings her blade with all her strength but the man easily parries her and the reforged sword shatters. She is left with naught but that broken piece she's carried for so long.

The man's smile is a thin line. "Broken sword, broken spirit."

"A broken blade is more than enough for the likes of you," the woman spits back.

She's wrong. The man attacks and it's all she can do to stay alive beneath his onslaught. He lands blow after blow and when they finally part again she's covered in her own blood. She needs to keep standing, but she can't. She stumbles to one knee. She stares down at her broken sword and her vision swims. She closes her eyes.

"At peace with yourself?" the man asks. "You will be." He advances slowly.

The woman opens her eyes. Her spirit is not lost. Her hands are stained, but her spirit is not lost. The runes on her black sword flare into life, temporarily blinding both man and woman with their brilliant green light.

The woman looks at the weapon in her hand and sees the emerald outline of a great sword issuing from the hilt she holds. She looks up and meets the man's eyes.

They clash once more. Though wounded, the woman draws strength from the steady glow of her sword. The man has no such reserve. It is not easy, but the woman cuts him down.

The man lies on the ground. He is not yet dying, but he is unable to continue. The woman stands over him. He glares up. "Make it quick. There is only death – mine or yours."

The woman raises her sword, then pauses. "So long I've wandered… so much death." She lowers her blade and the glow of the runes subsides. Mercy.

The man spits blood and it lands on the bamboo leaves by the woman's feet. "You can't run from yourself, Riven… I've tried."

In reply, the woman shakes her head. "I'm not looking back."

"I will follow this path until the end," the man warns. "I will not forget who I am."

The woman nods. She understands. "Choose your own path. I leave no doubt behind."

The man lies in the clearing.

The woman walks away.

(end)

there is a place between war and murder  
>in which our demons lurk<br>-scarlet shon-xan

* * *

><p>The Woman: Riven<br>The Enlightened One: Karma  
>The Mercenary: Sivir<br>The Crocodile: Renekton  
>The Jackal: Nasus<br>The Darkness: Nocturne  
>The Soldier: Garen<br>The Fox: Ahri  
>The Monkey: Wukong<br>The Assassin: Katarina  
>The Snake: Cassiopeia<br>The Statue: Galio  
>The Smith: Poppy<br>The Bladesman: Master Yi  
>The Man: Yasuo<p> 


End file.
